


The Yearning Hours

by mia_ugly



Category: RuPaul's Drag Race RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-31
Updated: 2019-12-31
Packaged: 2021-02-27 13:54:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,603
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22058107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mia_ugly/pseuds/mia_ugly
Summary: Brooke goes home for Christmas.
Relationships: Brooke Lynn Hytes/Vanessa Vanjie Mateo
Comments: 16
Kudos: 45





	The Yearning Hours

**Author's Note:**

  * For [artificialmac](https://archiveofourown.org/users/artificialmac/gifts).



> A Secret Santa Fic for (oh captain my captain) Artificialmac. I hope this is angsty enough for you. Thank you for all your poetry, for your kindness, and for being my late night yearning enabler. Happy holidays, baby.
> 
> (Thanks as well to Poppedthep for the incredibly helpful beta read and to Artificialmeggie for talking me down in the loveliest ways.)

_ Leaving you was easy _

_ Now I’ve got to do what’s hard _

_ I’ve got to stay away. _

-MUNA

December always makes Brooke homesick.

Maybe it’s a Canadian thing. Maybe it’s his constitution. Maybe he’s legitimately an ice queen like they always said, needs a bit of that teeth-chattering beauty, a taste of frostbite just to get him back to baseline.

Last year, after Season 11 filmed, he couldn’t go home for Christmas. He and Vanjie split in October and even though he had time, had space, had distance, everything still felt raw and pink and open. Not going home was for the best. If he  _ had _ gone home, his sister would’ve clocked that shit immediately, spotted his wrecked heart and tired eyes a mile off. 

It was for the best.

Anyway he was busy, and his career was taking the fuck off, and he just kept working. He buried any regrettable holiday nostalgia beneath sheer exhaustion (and the lingering taste of Vanessa in his mouth, the smell of that perfume on his skin, the honey-soft ghosts that haunt Brooke’s bedroom.)

The next year, a fter Season 11  _ aired _ , Brooke couldn’t go home for Christmas. He was touring and working and doing publicity for  _ Drag Race Canada  _ (those are all great excuses, but the truth of it was this: even though he was hollow-boned with weariness, he still wasn’t ready to see his family after a bunch of - tour stories suddenly become public information.)

You know the ones, sex and drugs and all that fun stuff. 

Listen: he’s not going to say he didn’t get a bit ragged after he and Vanjie split. That there weren’t too many regrettable nights to count on both hands. That being with Vanjie and not with Vanjie simultaneously (fucking in hotel rooms and then not talking on the road) didn’t do a bit of a number on his brain.

His coping methods weren’t always - the greatest. Ice queen, right? Shut those feelings down, shout over them, do whatever you have to do except feel them (even if it’s not strictly legal. Even if it’s not strictly safe.)

But this year, Brooke goes home for Christmas.

_ Drag Race Canada _ aired in the fall, and wasn’t that a fucking trip. It still feels a bit unreal, like it happened to someone else, like someone else is living this dream life of his. Brooke’s been all over the country for watch parties, and his mom doesn’t ask, knows better than to ask, but after the finale in Vancouver and a rushed trip back to Nashville to see his babies, Brooke actually asks  _ her. _

“I was thinking I might - come stay with you this year? If that’s okay.”

He doesn’t know why he says it. He only knows that he can’t spend another Christmas by himself. And of course his mom says yes, and then it’s off to Toronto in the middle of a fucking blizzard, just in time for Brooke to regret ever thinking this was a good idea.

“You look tired,” his mom says when she sees him at the airport. First words out of her mouth, but her voice is gentle with concern. “Are you sleeping?”

Brooke shrugs in response, and what that means is: Yeah, he _ is  _ tired. No, he isn’t sleeping much. He does this fun anxiety thing where he falls asleep no problem and then jerks awake around two, three in the morning. It’s been like that for the last year or so. Usually he just lets his mind race, hopes that it will eventually run itself into exhaustion and drop dead on the track. Sometimes he’ll nod out around five or six, if he’s lucky. But he could almost set his watch by the late night, sleepless hours that have him watching the ceiling, searching for patterns in the plaster that only exist in the darkness.

He told Courtney about it, and she laughed, called it ‘the yearning hours.’ There wasn’t all that much yearning going on - at least not at first - but he still thinks of them by that name in his mind. Those pre-dawn hours when he can’t relax, when his heart can’t stop aching over all the paths he should have chosen. Words he should’ve said.

Saying this to his mom isn’t going to make her worry less, and he doesn’t want her to worry, so he stays silent. Smiles tightly, fake-cough-laughs, that whole practiced thing (he knows how to get through family conversations without saying anything. He’s wildly talented in that regard, and anyone who would have called him out on it, seen through his bullshit, is miles and miles away. Hopefully somewhere sunny. Hopefully somewhere warm.)

“ _ Why you get to be all broke up about it,? Poor lil Twinkle Toes. We s’posed to feel bad for your frosty ass? You wanted me, you shoulda said. _ ” There’s a low, loose-gravel voice in Brooke’s ear, always there if Brooke cares to listen. “ _ You had me. You  _ had _ me. _ ”

Brooke listens.

S ome neighbour is playing  _ Boney M _ ’s Christmas album out of their slightly opened window as the car pulls up in front of Brooke’s mom’s house. Smoke from burning shortbread curls out alongside the lyrics like licks of tongue.

( _ I’m dreaming of a white Christmas. _

_ Just like the ones I used to know.) _

Listen. For a perfectionist Brooke’s feeling less and less perfect with each passing day. Feels like the cracks are showing through the paint, and even his mom is starting to see them.

Listen. Being broken-hearted at Christmas is its own kind of music. Written in a high, sugary key you feel in your fillings. Sweet as a cavity.

Brooke has gone most of his life not knowing this.  It’s been two years but t he broken-heart thing still feels new. He’s learning (he wishes he wasn’t.)

And yeah, it kind of sticks in his ribs that he’s still not over this - whatever it was - four months and loose change relationship. At this point they’ve been apart longer than they ever were together. It should be a fucking blip in Brooke’s timeline. 

But it isn’t.

He spends that first afternoon helping his mom string lights outside the house, stands on the wobbling metal ladder while snowflakes collect in his hair and his collar, melting against his skin. It’s fucking freezing out and Brooke’s lucky his hands don’t fuse to the eaves as he hooks the Christmas lights in place.

He’d forgotten Ontario winters. Forgotten how cold it is, how early it gets dark. Who the fuck was that idiot thinking he missed the cold? And how the fuck did he survive this growing up? He’s clearly gotten soft living in Nashville (“ _ Ain’t all of you gotten soft _ ,” someone growls filthy against the back of his neck, “ _ I’d know baby. _ ”)

Brooke can’t get warm afterwards, even when he’s inside in front of the fireplace. He always runs cold, bad circulation or something. He has a hot shower after supper but still can’t get the chill out of his bones. That night he lies in bed in his mom’s tiny guest room, buried underneath stacks of quilts and shivering. The yearning hours hit hard, and Brooke studies the ceiling but can’t stop seeing Vanjie’s face (s miling down at him, the way he used to when he was straddling Brooke’s hips, one hand fisted in Brooke’s hair, grinding just the way he liked, “ _ yeah baby, like that, like that, you’re - fuck, you’re gonna make me come  _ -“)

Fuck that. Brooke goes on his phone instead, burning through his corneas and his attention span. And that’s  when Vanjie texts him.

**_(Dec. 21st)_ **

**somebody still up**

Brooke is so sleep-deprived that at first he thinks he dreamt the text (he dreams in text messages sometimes. Text messages, re-tweets, follows - the sickness has its tendrils in his brain.) While he’s still blinking at his phone, Vanjie texts again.

**i see u fucking around on twitter.**

**ain’t it real late at the north pole**

**Can’t sleep** , Brooke sends back, ignoring the electricity that hums against his skin. Then he scrolls up to see the last time they messaged each other. It was a couple of weeks ago, some bullshit comments about their Christmas plans. Brooke said he was going home, Vanjie was going to Miami with his mom for a show and to see a couple queens he knew. 

Brooke doesn’t know which queens in particular. 

Doesn’t know how Vanjie knows them.

He didn’t ask. It’s none of his business.

**It’s the same time in Miami,** he texts back. **What are you doing up?**

**Bitch it’s early.**

**Not even 3.**

**We ain’t all elderly**

Brooke laughs, teeth gleaming white in the glow of his phone screen.

**U got ur old man slippers on? Drinking ur fibre shake?** Vanjie texts again, followed by seven old lady emojis. 

Fibre shake! Brooke resists the urge to throw his phone. He spends too long looking for some sort of furious reaction gif (Vanjie’s the one who taught him how to up his social media game, but he’s still mostly a disaster) and settles on a swearing emoji.

**Looking out for your health mama** , Vanjie replies, and Brooke rolls his eyes, pretends he doesn’t know about the stupid smile that’s crept onto his face. He shouldn’t smile like this when he’s texting with an ex. It’s been months since they’ve seen each other in person, almost a year since they last slept together. Vanjie was his first fucking boyfriend (and what Brooke means is: his first fucking love. The first love of his life. Call it what it is, you coward, or at least admit to yourself that you’re lying.)

But he’s not going to. He’s very careful about what he says, even in his head. Vanjie was his first boyfriend. His ex-boyfriend. And he’s not supposed to make Brooke feel this way, not anymore.

**Thought u were home for the holidays. Shouldn’t u be all relaxed and shit? Where’s mommy hytes with the foot rubs and warm milk**

**We’re up all night in Toronto. It’s how we do**

**How u do. Ok white boy**

There’s a bit of a pause as Brooke tries to think of what to say next, and in the meantime Vanjie texts back.

**wanna talk?**

**u can call me if u can’t sleep**

Brooke - does want to talk. But he’s not going to say that. 

**No it’s cool** , he texts instead. **I don’t want to keep you awake**

Vanjie responds immediately with the devil emoji: **u been keeping me awake**

Brooke stares at that text for a long time. 

His thumb hovers over his phone, trying to come up with a reply that won’t make this weirder than it is. A ‘you’ve been keeping me awake too’ or maybe that’s too much, maybe a ‘lol’ or a ‘I bet I have’ and an eggplant - laugh it off, roll your eyes (do anything but feel this, anything but address it.)

The next thing he knows, it’s bright out. 

He’s lying in his bed, phone still in his hand. There’s cold winter light shining through his window, and he’s alone. And it’s morning.

**_(December 22nd)_ **

There’s fuck all to do in the Toronto suburbs. 

Brooke goes jogging through the damp-booted streets and tries not to feel too much like an overgrown child in a giant drag queen’s body. That afternoon he has mandatory coffee with a couple of his mom’s friends, talks about his career in the most vague terms possible (even though they all know what he does at this point. And he knows his mom’s proud of him. He also knows she doesn’t want - specifics. So Brooke says  _ performer  _ and  _ dancer  _ and  _ television show. _ Nothing that could jog anyone’s memory too much, make them remember that yeah, he fucks men and wears dresses and dances en pointe for a living. Nothing to see here except a good Christian Canadian boy who somehow managed to make it in the arts.)

That night, when he jerks awake at 2 AM, he thinks about actually calling Vanjie. It’s just a brief dandelion puff of a thought, on his lips and then gone. Last night was clearly a one-off. They don’t do that sort of thing anymore, and Brooke knows better than anyone that he has no claim to Vanjie’s time. Of course they’re friends, and the friend thing is good. Lately it’s been more like acquaintances but - that’s probably for the best. It’s called moving on, Mary. It’s called - getting better.

His phone buzzes with a text message.

**u up?**

Fuck. 

The name on his screen does something stupid to Brooke’s heart. He shouldn’t be allowed to look at that name at this time of night when everything feels so close to the surface. 

**yeah. Can’t you sleep?** Despite any sort of protest he might have made, Brooke texts back. He can’t help it. He feels strange and molten and vulnerable in the darkness.

**nah. Did a Christmas show tonight still feeling all crazy**

**How’d the show go?**

**Why u even ask u know I killed it**

Brooke smiles around all the things he wants to say.  **Yeah I know. Stupid question.**

**Fuck yeah stupid question. What about u? Why r u awake?**

**Just** (Brooke pauses, doesn’t know how to answer that)  **thinking.**

Ugh. Just thinking? Nice work being a complete fucking cliché.

**Thinking anything nasty? that I should know about? ;)**

**You wish,** Brooke types, and then deletes it. He bites his lip. Changes it to  **I wish.** Wonders if that’s too much. It probably is. Shit.

**u shoulda called. I said u could**

There’s a pause before Vanjie texts again.

**I got ways of tiring u out girl u know i do.**

The flirty thing isn’t new. It’s familiar in an easy way, like a worn out pair of dance shoes. It’s what he and Vanjie always used to do: toss bullshit suggestive comments back and forth at each other instead of actually talking about the things that mattered. In this case, Brooke isn’t talking about why he can’t sleep, and Vanjie isn’t talking about why he’s texting an ex-boyfriend at two in the morning.

**I know you do** , Brooke texts back. This is what they do, right? Why mess with it.

**Just imagine Im there running my mouth at u. Put u right to sleep.**

Brooke doesn’t want to imagine that Vanjie’s there. That’s a dangerous fucking path to let his mind wander down (it’s happened more than he likes since they’ve been apart.)

**Like Im tryna tell u about that dance film u hate so much - remember??**

**I don’t** . There are too many dance films Brooke hates.

**u know the one I made u watch. Girls a ballerina and everyone’s dead**

**UM**

**Fuck it I’m googling this shit**

Brooke waits for Vanjie to get back to him, still shivering beneath his piles of blankets. He turns onto his side so he can nestle down and bury himself and his phone under the comforter.

**Save the Last Dance!!!!!** Vanjie texts triumphantly. **Bitch, u fell asleep twice that night - once when I was telling u about it, and then when I made u watch it.**

Brooke does remember it now, he does. Remembers trying to keep his eyes open and Vanjie’s shoulder so warm against his cheekbone (Vanjie was always warm, the opposite of an ice queen.)

**What the fuck - everyone was dead??** Brooke texts.

**Her parents and shit.**

**Oh ok then**

**Fuck u I’m right**

Brooke realizes he’s smiling again. Doesn’t matter how cold he gets, Vanjie still lights up something in his ribcage, in his stomach, in his mouth. Like he tried to swallow a sparkler, close his lips around it without getting burned too badly.

His eyelids flicker briefly, and he wrenches them open. Shit. It’s actually working.

**I’m going to try to sleep,** he texts, even though he doesn’t really want to. Sleep is kind of a precious commodity, but so are these lost moments with Vanjie. It’s best to - cut it short, though, and Brooke knows that. He’s always the one to leave before he overstays his welcome. Or does something stupid. And in the darkness and the cold, with Vanjie so far away and yet feeling so close at the same time, Brooke can only do something stupid.

**SEE?? I get u, I knew it’d work**

**I’m sorry I ever doubted your powers**

**Yeah, I like the sound of that. Call me if u need to I’ll be up**

Brooke takes a moment to wonder why Vanj can’t sleep. He said he was wired from the show. That’s understandable, Brooke gets the same way. Still.

**Get some sleep girl,** he texts, trying to sound as chill and un-motherly as possible (and what he means is: I’m worried about you. Should I be worried about you? Are you lonely? Are you alone?)

**Come here and make me ;)**

So much for sounding motherly. 

Brooke smiles and shakes his head (when he wakes up the next morning, his phone is still in his hand and he is still smiling.)

**_(December 23rd)_ **

That afternoon, snow comes down in diagonal sheets and Brooke bakes. He bakes revolting gingerbread jamjams, and sugar cookies dusted with cinnamon, and the same chocolate chip shortbread his grandma always made back when she could remember how to follow recipes (he puts a candied cherry on top of every one, red as a star. Red as Vanessa’s mouth.)

“How’s Jose doing?” his mom asks once (and only once.) “Are you still on friendly terms?”

_ Still on friendly terms. _ Brooke smiles around the ache of that question. Then he wipes his floured hands on his jeans because he may be a queen but he’s still a trashbag. 

“Yeah, we’re good.” It’s the same answer he’s given to so many well-meaning friends and family and fans in the past. “Good friends.” (And what he means is: fuck, he doesn’t even know at this point. They’re friends who occasionally kiss and fuck each other. Friends who text each other when they can’t sleep. Vanjie is a friend that Brooke dreams about, that Brooke wakes up reaching for, a good good  _ fucking _ friend -)

Brooke goes jogging again. 

Sometimes that’s all you can do, even in the middle of a blizzard. He tries to exercise himself to the point of exhaustion, and he stays away from screens an hour before he lies down. He reads a book even. And that night, when he wakes up a little after 2 AM, Brooke doesn’t even wait for the text message. 

He phones instead.

“Bitch, you’re lucky I was awake, or I’da have to whoop your ass.”

Brooke laughs, trying to keep the laugh quiet, make sure his mom (oh Christ, what is he, fifteen?) doesn’t hear him. This was a mistake, clearly. Texting with Vanjie is one thing, but actually hearing his voice is another. It makes Brooke’s empty hand clench into a fist.

“Why are you up?”

“Because I ain’t a senior citizen. We covered this. I been to the club, to the after-party, to the after-after-party -“

“Ah, fuck, of course. This is like mid-afternoon for you.”

“Damn right it is.” Vanjie laughs, and Brooke hates what that laugh does to him, even after two years of distance. “See, that’s why I have no problem talking your old ass to sleep. I ain’t got nothing else to do.”

“What about the after-after-after-party?”

“That don’t start until four.”

Brooke smiles like an idiot into the darkness.

“This shit getting worse, huh? The waking up at night. I remember -“ Vanjie starts and then stops. Brooke waits it out. Fuck, he could just lie in silence listening to Vanjie breathe and it would be enough for him.

“What?” he finally prompts, when it seems like Vanjie might need a push.

“Just. I remember y ou woke up sometimes. I noticed. You got this breathing thing you do, real steady. Put me right to sleep when we were - you know.”

“Yeah,” Brooke says softly. “I know.”

“Not that we slept that much.” Vanjie laughs all filthy, and it’s cute, but the comment is complete bullshit. When they were ‘dating-dating’ they slept more than Brooke maybe has in his life. There was a lot of grabbing and biting and kissing and fucking and all that good stuff, and afterwards they would pass the hell out, clinging to each other like drops of water. Vanjie was always warm and Brooke was cold as an East Coast winter, so it worked. The heat of Vanjie against his back was like an electric blanket and a Xanax washed down with a glass of wine: an instant cure for everything Brooke didn’t want to feel.

“But you woke up sometimes. I felt that. You’d get all stiff. Ha, not in the fun way.”

“You - never said anything.”

“What’d you want me to say? If I’da started hassling you about waking up and waking me up, you woulda got all guilty. Felt bad for my ass, when you ain’t had to.”

“But you should - I should’ve -“ Brooke feels guilty  _ now  _ is the thing. Just like Vanjie knew he would.

“I liked sleeping with you. I liked that cuddly shit, you know. I could handle your lil stiffies. It wasn’t a bad trade off. Besides.” There’s a pause that seems longer than it probably is. The stretch of time between knocking a glass off the table and the moment it hits the floor. “Besides. It don’t matter now.”

It shouldn’t matter - but it does. It does, and the knowledge makes him want to throw up a little bit.

“I’m still waking you up,” Brooke says, and Vanjie laughs again. Fuck - Brooke should be going to counseling or something, trying to figure out why that rough-throated sound can make him lose his damn mind.

“Yeah you are. How ‘bout that.” 

In the silence that follows, all Brooke’s useless words pile up like traffic in his mouth, bumper to bumper: Are you seeing anyone? What are you doing for New Year’s Eve? Is there someone you’re going to kiss? What are you doing Christmas morning? Is there going to be someone watching you wake up?

“You there, toes? Or have you toddled off to bed?”

“Still here,” Brooke says. 

“Me too.” The way Vanjie says it, sounds like he’s saying something else. “Me too.”

Brooke listens to him breathing until he falls asleep.

**_(December 24th)_ **

Brooke’s mom plays records. She still has this weird aversion to CDs (and don’t ever try to talk to her about Spotify or anything like that. Brooke tried once but ended up nearly being sectioned in the process.) She’s got all the Christmas LPs Brooke remembers from his childhood – The Carpenters, Vienna Boys Choir, the Elvis Christmas Album. And Brooke was raised in the church so Christmas carols are basically in his veins. He can’t sing worth a damn, but he knows how to hum along (his mom asks if he wants to go to midnight mass this year, and he absolutely does not.)

They spend Christmas Eve meal-prepping for the dinner tomorrow, and that evening Brooke reluctantly agrees to go out with the few friends he has left in Toronto. He cabs downtown to a terrible bar that’s mostly empty given the terrible weather. He drinks more than he should and comes home later than he wants to, soaked to the bone with snow and vodka.

He collapses into bed but he doesn’t fall asleep.

_ Don’t fucking call him, _ he tells himself, staring at the time on his phone.  _ It’s only one. It’s early. And it’s been four days of this, and you aren’t fucking dating him. Just because his voice makes you feel better, just because you’ve got this Vanjie-shaped hole in your ice-block heart, doesn’t give you the right to take up his time. You ended this. You both ended this. _

Brooke stares at his phone. Hates this time of night, and hates himself most of all.

“What’s good, mama?” Vanjie says as he answers. 

“Oh.” (Fuck. Fuck. He shouldn’t have done this, should have stopped himself.) “Hey. Sorry, you’re probably -“

“Nah, I’m just chillin’ in my hotel. It’s Christmas Eve, boo, everyone’s off fucking around with family.”

“Why aren’t you?”

“My mama and her man one room over. We’re gonna eat with some of the girls here tomorrow, keep it simple. What about you - you got that whole big family coming over?”

“Some of ‘em. It’ll be good. Nice.” They’ll light candles and turn on the fireplace, and maybe with a house full of people he loves, Brooke will finally feel warm.

He pictures Vanjie in bed, on the phone, a mirror image of Brooke himself. He pictures Vanjie soft and warm and smiling (and maybe this is all bullshit, maybe he’s in bed with some trade, all done up in leather or something - whatever. It’s the yearning hours, he can’t be rational.)

“You doin’ okay, baby?”

“Yeah,” Brooke says, and it means:  _ no _ . 

He thought heartache lessened with time, but this one is only getting worse. If anything, their first Christmas apart was easier. Maybe it’s because that first Christmas everything was still so fresh. They’d only been broken up for a couple months, and it had felt final, like scissors slicing through a ribbon. And Brooke had been so busy, hadn’t had a chance to get lonely.

That first Christmas he hadn’t known what would happen when the show aired. Hadn’t know what it would be like on tour. Hadn’t known the ‘play it up for the fans’ bit, the merch, the late nights at the clubs, the kiss to his cheekbone followed by teeth, needle sharp as a kitten’s.

That first Christmas apart, it was over. That second Christmas apart, it was over.

And it’s – still over now. It’s just tangled.

“I think I just - I needed this break. I’m getting burned out.”

“Girl, I could-- I dunno. Maybe you should come to L.A. or something. In the New Year, if you got time.” Vanjie’s voice is quiet, shy almost, like he’s asking something different. “You gotta see my new place. I got a spare room you can crash in. I’ll take you out, get you white-girl wasted. And you know Riley misses your dumb face.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Don’t know why, but - he does.”

There’s a silence. Brooke feels dizzy with it. Say something, quickly. Something flippant and unimportant. Something that fills the space but means nothing.

“Well. If Riley misses me.” What Brooke means is: ‘do  _ you _ miss me? Do you miss us? Do you ever wake up in the early hours of the morning and see my face, do you reach out across the bed and find only empty space?  _ Do you miss me _ because I sure as fuck miss -’ “You, uh, should try to get some sleep, papi.”

“Yeah, okay. You’re right. You too.”

“I’ll try.”

“And have a good time eatin’ turkey tomorrow, or whatever it is you get up in Canada. Moose or something? Beaver?”

“Shut up,” Brooke says and it means:  _ ‘ _ I like you so much. Way more than I should.’

“Nah, guess you ain’t one for eating beaver.”

“You’re so stupid.”

“Fuck you, I’m delightful as hell. See if I pick up on your sleepless ass next time, you treat me like this.” But Vanjie’s laughing, and the sound of his laughter follows Brooke through his dreams that night, soft and warm and just over his shoulder. 

Gone every time he turns back to reach for it.

**_(December 25th)_ **

The family shows up around noon the next day, his sister and her kids and two of his aunts and one of his cousins. It’s wonderful to see everyone, makes Brooke feel simultaneously twenty years younger and twenty years older. How did his nieces get so grown up? 

What happened, and how did he miss it?

He drinks small cups of sweet sherry (the kind his grandma used to drink, the only alcohol his mom has ever really been willing to allow in the house.) He drinks - maybe too many of them because when dinner’s over, when it’s all Christmas pudding and hard sauce, Brooke finds the candles have halos around them, and all the edges of the room taste sweet.

He’s almost happy. He’s almost warm.

After supper, Brooke does dishes (the kitchen still shines gold with the heat from the oven, and the dishwater is hot on his hands and fills the air full of steam.) His mom puts on a record - Pavarotti, Brooke thinks - and “O Holy Night” filters in from the living room.

You’d think it’d be easy sleeping after the amount of food and booze he consumes. You’d think he’d sleep straight through the night for a change. But of course, you’d be wrong. 

When the yearning hours hit, Brooke doesn’t reach for his phone. He doesn’t even think about it (he does, of course he does, but he’s got to have some sort of control. Right? This can’t keep happening.)

And then Vanjie calls him.

His voice is soft and slurred a bit, clearly he’s been drinking. Celebrating. He sounds good, happy. 

Warm. 

“Ho ho hooooo,” he drawls out slow. Brooke can hear the smile in his voice. “Santa treat you good this year?”

“Real good.”

“That’s disappointing.”

Brooke laughs, and Vanjie laughs back at him. 

“What’s funny? You know you ain’t on the nice list.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I think you do. Think you know all about it.”

Brooke’s grinning again, stupidly fond. And it’s late and he’s tired and tipsy and - he should just  _ say something. _

“How was - um - dinner?” No, that’s not it.

“Real nice. Got to catch up with some hos, get all the tea. It was good. How was your moose?”

“Fuck off.”

“That bad eh?”

“You are not as funny as you think you are.”

“Then why you always laughing, bitch?”

“Do you ever -”

Vanjie goes silent. Brooke does too. God damn it, why did he want to do this now? This question only ends at the edge of a cliff.

“Do you ever think -“ His mouth is dry and tastes like chalk. He blames it on the alcohol, and not on nerves. “Think about -“

“Girl, how much you had to drink?”

“-us?” Brooke forces himself to finish the sentence.

Vanjie says nothing. For a long time, he says nothing.

“Course I do. But - shit. It doesn’t - why? Do you?”

“I miss you,” Brooke says. “I -”

Vanjie interrupts with a laugh like rattling bones.

“Ha. Sure you do bitch. From miles away, maybe. You don’t miss shit when we’re all up close and personal. Missin’ me sounds real cute when I’m a lil’ voice in your ear. Soon as I’m leaving earrings and shit all over your apartment you can’t wait to be done with me.”

Brooke doesn’t know how to respond to that. Well - he does, but the word hurts to even think about. He can’t imagine how much it will hurt to say.

But he says it. 

“Maybe.” (And he means ‘no,  _ no _ , I miss you in every way, I’ll never be done with you.’ But of course he doesn’t say the last bit.)

“See? I get you.” Vanjie barks out another painful laugh. “We cool. Don’t go messin’ with a good thing, right? There ain’t no point.” He swallows, and Brooke pictures the bob of his throat, remembers the way it used to taste. 

“Okay. But -”

“But what, Brock?”

There’s a block of ice where Brooke’s heart should be, something carved very carefully (with very sharp tools) into the shape of a swan. But still from somewhere inside that block of ice the words _I love you_ beg to rattle out. Brooke can almost taste them in his mouth ( _you know, right? You’re so smart, you have to know it. That’s what all this is about, all these late night conversations, all this polite dancing around - you go first, no - after you. That’s what this is, that’s what caught in my throat, you have to know -_ )

Fucking say it. It’s dark out, there’s no one there to hear it but Vanjie. Jose. Say it. It’s late, the yearning hours, the time of night where nothing can be held against you. Say it.

“Merry Christmas,” Brooke says into the quiet black of his mom’s guestroom. 

And he means: ‘I’m still stupid in love with you, still out of my head in love with you, and if I say it I’ll only fuck everything up. I’ve already fucked it up once, I can’t do it again. Not to you.’

Vanjie lets out a long sigh before he speaks.

“Merry Christmas, baby,” he says (and it means: ‘I’m still in love with you and you already broke my heart once, if you break it again I might never get it working but I’m braver than you, and you know that, and I’d try, and you probably know that too.’) 

“Thanks,” Brooke says (and it means: ‘please say it first.’) “Think you can sleep now?”

“Guess we’ll see,” Vanjie says (and it means: ‘please say it first.’) “What about you?”

“I’ll - try.” As the words leave his mouth, it sounds like Brooke is saying something different. “I can try.”

“Huh,” Vanjie says softly. “Well. Let me know how that goes, that tryin'."

"I will."

Vanjie laughs in his ear, a soft, genuine laugh like a glass of champagne, full of glitter. And lying there under his pile of blankets, for the first time in a long, long time, Brooke is warm.

And for a little while, he can sleep.


End file.
